1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of sorting a plurality of conveyed articles in a suspension-type conveyor means, the articles circulating on a first conveyor circuit in unsorted fashion and being delivered from there individually and automatically to at least one second conveyor path and arranged in groups.
Such a method is known from GB-A-2 079 708. In the known method, garments which are hanging on cloth hangers are hung in unsorted fashion and by hand individually onto a conveyor circulating within a closed conveyor circuit in predetermined direction. Each individual cloth hanger is retained on the conveyor by means of a latch member which must be opened automatically. The circulating conveyor is guided past a multitude of conveyor rods which are formed as a second conveyor path for a respective group of predetermined articles. Discharge rods which are positioned below the cloth hanger hooks and intercept each hanger whose latch member has been opened above the discharge rod are positioned between the slide rods and the conveyor circuit. The articles, however, must be discharged in their predetermined order within the arranged group from the conveyor circuit on the known conveyors which are formed as dead-end sections. This means that a specific article which is actually to be transferred on a specific slide rod has to be passed in the first conveyor circuit past its slide rod so many times until all articles collecting in front of it on its slide rod have been ejected. The known method is therefore very time-consuming.
2. Related Prior Art
Furthermore, it is known as a general sorting principle of the so-called associated order-picking method that presorted articles are brought together by clocked circulation in a conveyor circuit with conveyor means that respectively receive a specific group of finally sorted articles, the conveyor means rotating also in clocked fashion along a second conveyor circuit. The transfer, however, is most of the time carried out by hand or with the aid of complicated shifting means and never out of the conveying movement (the conveyor and the type of article must be stopped in step for each transfer). Consequently, only presorted articles are transferred.